


What makes you hideous

by D_Nova



Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types, Wiedźmin | The Witcher Series - Andrzej Sapkowski
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Insecurity, Light Angst, M/M, Spoilers, i guess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-19
Updated: 2020-08-19
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:42:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25989148
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/D_Nova/pseuds/D_Nova
Summary: 'Be not deceived with the first appearance of things, for show is not substance.' ~ an English proverbAttention! Please, read the notes for more details as the work might contain mild spoilers.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 2
Kudos: 47





	What makes you hideous

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! I am currently reading the book series, and I haven't watched the show, though I've seen some clips. I've just started the 'Blood of Elves' book, and what happens in this story follows a certain event from the 'Sword of Destiny'. This work contains small spoilers, not something important, but they are spoilers still. In the following paragraph I'll briefly explain the situation. Even if the spoilers don't really reveal major or important events, I felt the need to warn you. Ah, and yes, just in case: Jaskier and Geralt are NOT in a romantic relationship in the books. But that's a fanfic, so I decided to give it a try ┐(‘～` )┌ If you still would like to read what I've written, please, enjoy! I hope you'll like it.  
> 
> 
> After chasing a mimic at a market, Geralt traps him in a tent, and the latter 'turns into' the witcher, copying his appearance, ready to fight. The man considers himself to be not very much attractive, which, in this story, leads to him feeling insecure about it. Jaskier is determined to make him feel better.

They left Novigrad hours ago, but the memories of what happened at the market followed Geralt far beyond the city’s walls. He tried to occupy his mind with something else, tried to shift his attention to another subject, but to no avail. The incident pursued his thoughts like a curse pursues an unfortunate soul.

The sky was clouding up, darkening more and more with every passing moment, just like the witcher’s expression. Geralt, staring straight ahead at the pitch-black woods in the distance, subconsciously tightened his grip on the reins.

Meanwhile Jaskier was walking along with the witcher atop Roach, smiling merrily and singing something silly. When the bard looked at his companion his voice faltered and he fell silent, though his fingers kept strumming the strings of his lute, and quizzically raised a brow at the gloomy frown on Geralt’s face. After a few minutes he decided to put the instrument away. The witcher didn’t react.

“What’s bothering you, my friend?” the poet turned back and asked him. Geralt blinked and shot a glance at the man, the lute behind his back catching his eye. He had been so deep in thought that he didn’t hear the music stop. His frown deepened. Jaskier put his hands in the pockets of his trousers and looked up at the sky that was overcast with storm clouds. A sudden gust of wind blew his fancy hat away and tousled his hair. The bard yelped, but managed to catch it. “You could’ve just told me if you didn’t really want to go to ‘Passiflora’, though I thought it a decent distraction from all the trouble we had to go through.” Jaskier ran his hand through his soft strands and tried to fix the ruffled feather on his hat, but only made it worse and pouted. Geralt turned away. 

He inhaled. The faint smell of ozone had strengthened noticeably. 

“I’m always at your service if you feel the need to unburden yourself, you know” the bard said sincerely after a short moment of silence, putting his hat back on his head. His eyes held concern in their blue depth. The witcher sighed heavily and cleared his throat. He knew that he could tell him pretty much anything.

“When the mimic and I were in the tent,” Geralt said with a slight strain in his voice “before he turned into you and ran out, he first turned into me.” Jaskier let out a small surprised sound and jumped a little at the distant rumble of thunder. “Did you fight?” 

“No, though he expected me to.” The witcher answered. From the corner of his eye he saw a flash of lightning somewhere to his right. Then there was thunder again, but now closer, louder, as if it was threatening them and at the same time warning of the upcoming storm.

Jaskier hummed, encouraging Geralt to continue. He spent some time contemplating on how to explain it to the bard, how to explain what had been bugging him since they had left the damned city. How to reveal the secret, the _insecurity_ that had been hidden in the far corner of his mind and soul until the previous day, until this very moment. He weighed his next words and said at last: 

“I wish that what I saw there wasn’t my reflection.” He remembered the nasty, audacious, lopsided grin, the unpleasantly rough voice, the unnatural, glowing yellow irises and sharp, vertical cat-like pupils. He remembered the face. “I wish that what I saw there wasn’t _me_.”

Geralt closed his eyes. Oh, what he would give to erase the memory. 

“And you it wasn’t” the witcher flipped his head at the poet and scowled skeptically, as if he was asking him, _‘seriously?’_ But Jaskier nodded firmly, looking back at Geralt, earnest and determined. 

“He wasn’t you. Well, I mean, yes, he might’ve turned into a very much convincing copy of you, but he wasn’t really you. That’s what I’m saying.”

“You should’ve seen it,” the witcher let out a bitter bark of laughter “such a hideous sight.”

“What exactly do you mean by ‘a hideous sight’, Geralt?”

The witcher didn’t answer. There was no need to.

It felt like the air around them was being prickled with sharp charges of energy, though it hadn’t started raining yet. It felt like the storm had picked a particular moment in the near future and was now stalling, waiting to crash down on them. 

They both knew what the witcher was thinking. The incident made him wonder how people could look into his face, some even not running away or throwing stones. How some of them could walk up to and gather up the courage to speak to him. How some of them even wished to get _intimate_. How some of them even went as far as to _take a liking_ in someone that certain people called a monster among humans. 

At some points of their lives Geralt called himself a mutant, and every time he did, Jaskier felt exasperated, seething, and utterly, immeasurably sad, because he knew what was behind that ‘hideous sight’, what very few were allowed to witness, because only those who cared truly were able to see it.

Jaskier turned away and cast his eyes down, bit his lower lip and shook his head in evident annoyance, balling his hands into fists, his knuckles turning white from the pressure.

“I’ll tell you something now, dear witcher, and I don’t want a single word falling from your lips until I finish.” He pointed his head in the direction of the forest, implying that they, perhaps, should pick up speed. Geralt spurred Roach and the bard moved in longer strides, keeping up with them. 

“I must admit that, yes, at first you seem quite, let’s be honest, menacing. And it’s true, you do look menacing, and gloomy, and angry, and bitter, and _I_ _haven’t finished yet_.” He raised a finger at Geralt, who was about to make a sarcastic comment, and gave him a pointed look that said _‘we made a deal’_ , and the witcher answered him with another pointed look, which could be interpreted as _‘I didn’t say anything’_.

“However, looks are not the most vital thing in a person. Well, if only you don’t work at a brothel, or as a waitress in a tavern popular with local folks and tourists, or if your husband’s parents don’t expect you to deliver their lovely grandchildren in this terrible world of ours, you understand.” 

“You are ‘a hideous sight’ only to those morons who plunged into the poorly written fairytales about terrible witchers who come at night to steal their wives’ children, and drowned in their fears and ignorance, refusing to see past the end of their noses,“ the bard said gruffly, his breathing a bit shallow from walking fast and, perhaps, irritation. 

“Those, however, who are reasonable enough to observe the reality around them, are more concerned about what lies beneath that ‘hideous sight’,” the poet continued, “to them, you are something much more than this, and what they see below, they admire _–you promised-_ “ Geralt answered him with a snort, but stayed silent. 

“The majority of them admire you as a witcher, as is, a professional, a master of sword, and, what is the most important to them, a saviour, a promise of peace and protection. You tend to say that you do this for the coin and for the coin only, but you can’t deceive me, Geralt. I know that you care, and they, perhaps, though subconsciously, know it too. And that is why, to them, you’re not a ‘hideous sight’, but something better than a knight in shining armour from their beloved fairytales, and much more honourable.”

“Others admire you, well, for the person you are in general. You are sensible, honest, straightforward, stoic, valiant, and many more things that you have already heard me sing numerous times, and all those things about you, unlike, I have to admit, some of the details I add to the stories of your breathtaking adventures and monster hunts, are very true and real.”

When they finally reached the forest, Jaskier halted right in front of the first line of dark, huge trees. Geralt stopped Roach. The poet lowered his head, as if carefully weighing and preparing his next words, and then raised it abruptly with a determined expression on his face. 

“And there are those who care for you because they can see past your appearance and person,” he looked down again and gulped visibly, his cheeks turning slightly rosy, “those who look into your very soul and see how deeply you can feel, what an impressive range of emotions, even if suppressed to a certain extent, you are able to express and experience, even though some say that you are insensitive, apathetic, and indifferent. They admire how much more humane you, a _‘mutant’_ , are compared to _humans themselves_.” 

Geralt stared back into Jaskier’s eyes. They were so captivating, enticing and a blue so dark from the lack of sunlight, dark and deep like whirlpools in a raging ocean, dark like the shadows of the forest they were about to step in, shadows that hid something in them that you could only discover if engulfed in their umbra completely; eyes that were brimmed with such raw emotion that it seemed like it would spill on his lashes and stream down his flustered cheeks like tears. The witcher felt like drowning in them. 

The blinding lightning that struck the ground somewhere in the field behind them was like a faint shining of a lighthouse through a dense morning mist compared to the bright, alluring yellow glow of Geralt’s own eyes. It seemed as if the magic flowing through his very being tried to escape through his amber irises. It seemed like calm before the storm. 

The moment was broken by a deafening roar of thunder that made them both jerk. Jaskier blinked rapidly and turned away abruptly, clearing his throat with a fist to his lips. His cheeks reddened even more. Geralt closed his eyes tightly and shook his head. “Let’s go.”

They hurried into the forest, the branches of the trees covering them from the first raindrops that soon turned into a downpour. 

After a few minutes of walking in complete silence, Jaskier murmured:

“But, besides what I’ve already said, I feel I need to make it clear that I don’t find the sight of you hideous, or anything like that. Quite the contrary.”

In the caliginous atmosphere of the black trees surrounding them the witcher’s glowing eyes didn’t give out enough light for an upright twitch of the corners of his lips to be seen. 


End file.
